Johns Hopkins Bayview Medical Center

Expertise

Research Interests

Biography

Dr. Christopher-Stine is an Associate Professor of Medicine and Neurology and is the Director of the Johns Hopkins Myositis Center, a multidisciplinary clinic formally established in 2007 on the Johns Hopkins Bayview campus and one of the largest, most comprehensive centers of its kind worldwide. Over the past 14 years, she has been involved in clinical research related to idiopathic inflammatory myopathies (“myositis”) and has authored or co-authored over 40 publications.

Dr. Christopher-Stine and her colleagues recently discovered that some statin-related myopathies are, in fact, autoimmune in nature. This discovery is a true example of the excellent collaboration and translational research opportunities at Johns Hopkins that has helped to solve a medical mystery and has benefitted patients directly. In her role as the attending inpatient consult rheumatologist, she investigates a wide variety of autoimmune rheumatic diseases including vasculitis, systemic sclerosis, and lupus.

In addition, she serves as a member of The Johns Hopkins Institutional Review Board and enjoys teaching both formally and informally at all levels of medical education from students to fellows to faculty. She takes pleasure in the interplay of her roles as clinician, scientist, and educator.

Certifications

Research Summary

Dr. Christopher-Stine’s primary research focus is clinical research pertaining to inflammatory myopathies – specifically describing unique phenotypes, novel therapeutic approaches, and novel disease subsets among patients with inflammatory myopathies who are part of the growing cohort of over 1500 patients evaluated clinically for confirmed or suspected muscle disease at the Myositis Center who agree to be part of the Johns Hopkins Myositis database. Dr. Christopher-Stine and her colleagues made the novel discovery of an autoimmune myopathy closely linked to statins. She has a continued interest in statins and their toxicities toward muscle, both as a direct muscle toxin as well as its contribution to autoimmune muscle injury.

Dr. Christopher-Stine and her team are currently investigating the burden of calcinosis in adult dermatomyositis by patient self-report and then utilizing novel imaging modalities to examine the extent of calcinosis in these patients. In addition, as patient reported outcomes are growing increasingly important, especially in the context of clinical trials, they are an increasing focus of investigative efforts at the Myositis Center. Specifically, Dr. Christopher-Stine and her team are undertaking an international effort to determine the most appropriate patient-driven outcome measures in the inflammatory myopathies.